The Eight-Day Week: August 3-August 10

The Met is open until midnight tonight so that late, late latecomers can check out Alexander McQueen’s wares before the exhibit closes permanently. A night spent experiencing the glories of the museum? We remember that children’s book! Most everyone we know has raved about the Costume Institute show, but we’ve been pretty busy all summer (the Newport mansions can’t save themselves, you know, and there’s pretty intriguing costumery to check out there as well!), and the museum’s been bending over backwards to accommodate busy (lazy!) people like us all summer, with admission on Mondays and now late-night shows. Is any innovation quite so welcome in this go-go city as a museum for the nocturnal? We hope the trend catches on—nothing would lull us to sleep quite like the soft glow of MoMA’s Rothkos. (We do love McQueen, too, but we’re sure those severe, radical clothes will give us a few nightmares!)

Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 Fifth Avenue, exhibition open until 12am August 6 and 7, visit metmuseum.org for more information.

Monday, August 8

Day for Night

We’re still vicariously embarrassed for dear old drama geek Anne Hathaway in her noble, pathetic attempt to host the Oscars by sheer force of will. She tried so very hard! She laughed at her own jokes to fill cavernous silences! Well, her new film might have put the brakes on her earnest, overbearing schtick and given us the chance to remember why we loved her in the first place. Ms. Hathaway, as a British lady separated from her one true love but for an annual brief encounter, puts her high-school-production-of-Oliver! on for the new film One Day, which she’s fêteing at the red carpet premiere tonight. Do you think Ms. Hathaway’s erstwhile Oscar co-host James Franco would consider it a suitable art project to come as our plus-one?

One Day premiere, an Upper West Side movie palace, screening at 7pm.

Wednesday, August 10

Rangel Me an Invite

It’s Christmas for politicos with the annual Charles Rangel birthday gala (the Congressman was born in June, but that’s not a slow news month that will guarantee headlines!). Planned attendees at the Plaza Hotel bash include Governor Andrew Cuomo, Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Charles Schumer, and Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer—all familiar faces from last year’s bash, which went on during Mr. Rangel’s ethics investigation. Also planning to attend is Aretha Franklin, who’ll sing for the assembled guests: she was supposed to sing last year, but fell and broke her ribs, so Psychic Friend Dionne Warwick turned up instead. Broken ribs are perhaps the only excuse that can keep prominent machers away from the ever-popular Mr. Rangel: “I felt bad—because Aretha felt so bad!,” said Mr. Rangel’s fundraising consultant Darren Rigger, who noted that Ms. Franklin was pleased to make up for her truancy. As for the party–why the Plaza and not, you know, something in Mr. Rangel’s district? “Charlie is iconic,” said Mr. Rigger. “We needed a place that had that same feel—you remember the Black and White Balls, the galas, it sends a powerful message. There’s a lot of places, and I’m not going to say bad things about other places, but this place is iconic for throwing a gala.” Indeed! If Truman Capote were alive today, he’d love nothing more than hanging out with New York politicians.